Tag Archives: Iraq

At least 40 killed in Damascus bombing targeting Shi’ites

Syrian army soldiers and civilians inspect the damage at the site of an attack by two suicide bombers in Damascus, Syria March 11, 2017. REUTERS/Omar Sanadiki

BEIRUT/DAMASCUS/BAGHDAD (Reuters) – A double bomb attack targeting Shi’ite pilgrims in Damascus killed at least 40 Iraqis and wounded 120 more who were going to pray at a nearby shrine, the Iraqi foreign ministry said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Saturday’s attack, which the Hezbollah-run al-Manar TV station said had been carried out by two suicide bombers.

Footage broadcast by Syrian state TV showed two badly damaged buses with their windows blown out. The area was splattered with blood and shoes were scattered on the ground.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has been supported in the country’s war by Shi’ite militias from countries including Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon.

The attack took place at a bus station where the pilgrims had been brought to visit the nearby Bab al-Saghir cemetery, named after one of the seven gates of the Old City of Damascus.

The second blast went off some 10 minutes after the first, inflicting casualties on civil defence workers who had gathered to tend to the casualties, the Damascus correspondent for al-Manar told the station by phone.

The pilgrims were due to pray at the cemetery after visiting the Sayeda Zeinab shrine just outside Damascus, he said.

Sayeda Zeinab – the granddaughter of the Prophet Mohammad – is venerated by Shi’ites and her shrine is a site of mass pilgrimage for Shi’ites from across the world. It has also been a magnet for Shi’ite militiamen in Syria.

Iran has backed Assad in the conflict that erupted in 2011.

Last June, Islamic State claimed responsibility for bomb attacks near the Sayyida Zeinab shrine.

The Lebanese group Hezbollah is also fighting in support of Assad.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Toby Chopra and Alexander Smith)

Islamic State frees Mosul prisoners as grip on last major city slips

Iraqi rapid response members are seen as they try to avoid being hit by Islamic State snipers in western Mosul, Iraq March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Islamic State has released dozens of prisoners held in jails in the districts of the northern Iraqi city of Mosul that remain under its control, residents said on Saturday.

The release of the prisoners on Friday is another sign that the militants are being overwhelmed by the U.S.-backed Iraqi offensive that started on Oct. 17 to dislodge them from Mosul, their last major city stronghold in Iraq.

Islamic State has lost most cities it captured in Iraq in 2014 and 2015. It declared a caliphate that also spanned parts of Syria from Mosul in 2014.

Among those released were people who had been caught selling cigarettes, violating a smoking ban, or in possession of a mobile phone and therefore suspected of communicating with the outside world, the residents said.

Iraqi forces dislodged Islamic State from the eastern side of Mosul in January, and on Feb. 19 launched the offensive on the districts located west of the Tigris river.

State-run TV on Friday said about half western Mosul has been taken back from the militants who are besieged in the old city center and districts to the north.

One of the men released on Friday said two militants got him out of a basement where he was held captive with other people, blindfolded the group and drove them away in a bus.

“After driving a distance, we stopped and they told us to remove the blindfolds and then they said ‘go, you are free,'” he said by phone, adding that about 25 prisoners were on the bus.

The man, who requested not to be identified, indicated that had spent two weeks in prison for selling cigarettes.

One Mosul resident said his brother had suddenly reappeared at the house on Friday after spending a month in captivity for possessing a mobile phone.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Alexander Smith)

Islamic State mortars, snipers take toll on Iraqi forces in Mosul

A sniper from Iraq's Federal Police force takes aim at Islamic State positions from the roof of a house on the frontline in Albu Saif, south of Mosul. REUTERS/Alaa Al-Marjani

By John Davison

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – At a field clinic near the front line in Mosul, an Iraqi Federal Police officer lay in discomfort on a stretcher, a drip in his arm and bandage plastered over his chest from where shrapnel from a mortar shell had pierced his sternum.

The blast which wounded the 23-year-old, Jaafar Kareem, and two comrades, was in an area where rapid advances against Islamic State earlier in the week have slowed as the militants aim mortar and sniper fire at Iraqi troops.

At least 10 shells had landed there that morning, before hitting their target, Kareem said.

“There have been a lot of our guys wounded today in the same area,” he said, turning his head gingerly to watch an officer on the next stretcher being treated for a leg injury.

The makeshift clinic, an abandoned house manned by American volunteers and Iraqi military medics, was on Thursday regularly treating members of Iraq’s security forces rushed back from the front line in ambulances or armored vehicles.

“We’ve already had around 20 people come in for treatment (on Thursday) – about 70 percent civilian, but it’s been more military (casualties) up until today,” said Kathy Bequary, director of NYC Medics, the organization running the clinic.

Casualties her team have witnessed recently range from superficial wounds to the occasional patient dead on arrival, including one soldier with eight bullet wounds to his torso, she said.

As Iraqi forces fight Islamic State militants deeper into western Mosul, they face increasingly stiff resistance, with the jihadists using mortar and sniper fire to try to hold off a U.S.-backed offensive to drive them out of their last major stronghold in the country.

The fight has taken its toll of dead and wounded on Iraqi soldiers, special forces and police units. The military has not published the number of its own casualties.

Islamic State’s tactics, which include taking cover among the civilian population, have also slowed advances in some areas, the closer the battle gets to the more crowded city center.

The area where Kareem and his comrades were hit was no more than a few hundred meters from the front line, in an area housing the Nineveh provincial government headquarters, a territorial gain trumpeted by the Iraqi military on Tuesday.

Iraqi forces have indeed made progress there. A wide main road leading to the governorate building was firmly under Federal Police control on Thursday, a Reuters correspondent visiting with elite interior ministry units said.

STATIC FRONT LINE

Armored vehicles drove past destruction left by fighting in the former provincial government hub: a collapsed police headquarters dynamited by militants as they retreated, and a large, faded advertisement panel for “Iraqi Airways – Mosul booking office.”

But the front line had been static since early in the week, members of the Rapid Response units said.

Troops on foot had to dash between the more exposed streets for fear of sniper fire.

The whoosh of an incoming mortar shell sent them scrambling for cover against the wall of a building. It landed close enough to feel shockwaves from the blast.

“It’s been a little difficult, recently,” Ali Sattar, a 20-year-old in the Rapid Response said.

“We’ve not really advanced for three days now. Two of our teams went further forward, on a sort of recce mission, and raised the Iraqi flag on top of a tall hotel that (Islamic State) snipers have been using, then came back.”

Federal Police units were now in control of the Mosul museum, a little further forward, but any new advances were being made difficult by snipers who had taken up positions in the Assyria Hotel, less than 200 meters (yards) away, he said.

“The flag will probably be taken down again by the militants,” he said, half joking.

Back at the clinic, the wounded Kareem looked weary.

“The battles have been hard,” he sighed.

(Reporting by John Davison; Editing by Michael Perry)

Iraq aims to drive Islamic State from west Mosul within a month

Displaced Iraqi people, who fled their homes during a battle between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants, carry their belongings in Mosul, Iraq March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

By Ahmed Rasheed and John Davison

SULAIMANIYA/MOSUL (Reuters) – Iraqi forces aim to dislodge Islamic State militants from west Mosul within a month, despite grueling urban combat in densely populated terrain, the head of the elite Counter Terrorism Service told Reuters on Thursday.

As Iraqi forces advance deeper into west Mosul, they are facing increasingly stiff resistance from Islamic State militants using suicide car bombs and snipers to defend their last major stronghold in Iraq.

Their operation to retake the eastern bank of the city, launched in mid-October with support from a U.S.-led coalition, took more than three months. The offensive to recapture west Mosul got underway less than three weeks ago.

“Despite the tough fighting… we are moving ahead in persistence to finish the battle for the western side within a month,” Lieutenant General Talib Shaghati told Reuters at a conference in Sulaimaniya.

Smoke rises from clashes during a battle between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

Smoke rises from clashes during a battle between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

The few thousand militants still fighting in west Mosul are overwhelmingly outnumbered by a 100,000-strong array of Iraqi forces, but their ruthless tactics east of the Tigris river late last year enabled them to hold out much longer than the government’s initial optimistic predictions.

Mosul is by far the largest city which Islamic State has held in its cross-border, self-declared caliphate in Iraq and Syria. It has been losing ground in both countries, with three separate forces, backed by the United States, Turkey and Russia, advancing on its Syrian stronghold of Raqqa.

In Mosul, CTS forces recaptured the Moalimin and Silo districts on Thursday, according to the commander of the campaign Lieutenant General Abdul Ameer Rasheed Yarallah.

Inside the city, CTS are fighting alongside the Federal Police and the elite interior ministry Rapid Response force, which earlier this week recaptured the provincial government headquarters and the Mosul museum.

A federal police colonel said on Thursday there were skirmishes close to the museum, where the militants filmed themselves destroying priceless statues and sculptures in 2015.

“The frontline is just beyond it,” said Lieutenant Colonel Hammeed Habib of the Rapid Response forces. “There are snipers stationed in tall hotel buildings on a road beyond that line”.

A 5-months-old child suffering from dehydration, Batoul Bashir Ahmad, is carried by his mother, an Iraqi displaced woman who fled her home during a battle between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants, in Mosul, Iraq March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

A 5-months-old child suffering from dehydration, Batoul Bashir Ahmad, is carried by his mother, an Iraqi displaced woman who fled her home during a battle between Iraqi forces and Islamic State militants, in Mosul, Iraq March 9, 2017. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

The Iraqi army’s ninth division and Shi’ite paramilitary forces said on Wednesday they had cut the main road between the city and the Islamic State stronghold of Tal Afar to the west, tightening a noose around the city.

There is little doubt Iraqi forces will eventually prevail over the militants, who are both outnumbered and overpowered, but even if it loses Mosul, Islamic State is expected to revert to their insurgent tactics of old.

On Wednesday, bomb blasts ripped through a wedding party near Tikrit, which was recaptured by Iraqi forces in 2015, killing more than 20 people.

The jihadist group has lost most of the cities it captured in northern and western Iraq in 2014 and 2015. In Syria, it still holds Raqqa city as its stronghold, as well as most of Deir al-Zor province.

(Writing by Isabel Coles; Editing by Dominic Evans)

Iraqi forces see off Islamic State attack, seize road out of Mosul

A displaced Iraqi man carries his granddaughter while fleeing his home, as Iraqi forces battle with Islamic State militants, in western Mosul, Iraq March 8, 2017. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

By Isabel Coles and Ahmed Rasheed

MOSUL/SULAIMANIYA, Iraq (Reuters) – Iraqi forces saw off an overnight Islamic State counter-attack near Mosul’s main government buildings and took full control on Wednesday of the last major road leading west to the militant-held town of Tal Afar, the military said.

Inside the city troops battled the ultra-hardline Sunni Muslim fighters, who hid among the remaining civilian population and deployed snipers and suicide car bombs to defend their last major Iraq stronghold.

The U.S.-backed campaign to crush the militants saw Iraqi forces recapture the eastern side of the city in January, and launch their assault on the western half last month.

Fighting is expected to get tougher as Iraqi troops get push further into the more densely populated areas, including Mosul’s old city.

Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared the group’s self styled-caliphate, which has spanned areas of northern Iraq and eastern Syria, from the Nuri Mosque in Mosul’s old city in June 2014.

Militants used car bombs in their nighttime counter-attack around the governorate building, Major General Ali Kadhem al-Lami of the Federal Police’s Fifth Division told a Reuters correspondent near the site. “Today we’re clearing the area which was liberated,” he said.

Military officials had said that Rapid Response troops, an elite interior ministry division, recaptured the provincial government headquarters on Tuesday, as well as the central bank branch and the museum where militants filmed themselves destroying priceless statues in 2015.

“The museum is completely empty of all artifacts. They were stolen, possibly smuggled,” Lami said. Reuters was not yet able to access the museum to verify.

Lami said most of the fighters that had fought around the governorate building were local but there were some foreigners.

“An order was issued for foreign fighters with families to withdraw with them. Those who do not have a family should stay and fight, whether foreign or local,” he said.

The few families remaining in the nearby Dawasa district said the militants had set some of their homes on fire as security forces advanced and that the militants had fought among themselves.

LAST ROAD FROM MOSUL

Later on Wednesday, the Iraqi military said the army and Shi’ite paramilitary forces had taken full control of the last major road leading west out of Mosul towards the town of Tal Afar, state TV reported.

The 9th Armored Division and two Shi’ite fighting groups had “isolated the right bank (western side of Mosul) from Tal Afar”, it said.

The road links Mosul to Tal Afar, another Islamic State stronghold 60 km (40 miles) to the west, and then to the Syrian border.

Shi’ite militias which are part of the Mosul campaign began to close in on Tal Afar late last year, after the offensive was launched, and said they linked up with Kurdish fighters nearby to encircle the jihadists.

A 100,000-strong force of Iraqi military units, Shi’ite forces and Kurdish fighters, backed by a U.S.-led coalition, have fought since October in the intensive Mosul campaign.

Losing Mosul would deal a fatal blow to the Iraqi part of Islamic State’s self-styled caliphate, which its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared from the city’s Nuri Mosque in 2014, and which has spanned large areas of Iraq and neighboring Syria.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said Iraq would continue hitting Islamic State targets in Syria, as well as in neighboring countries if they give their approval.

Abadi on Feb. 24 announced the first Iraqi air strike on Syrian territory, targeting Islamic State positions in retaliation for bomb attacks in Baghdad.

“I respect the sovereignty of states, and I have secured the approval of Syria to strike positions (on its territory),” Abadi told a conference in the Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaimaniya on Wednesday.

“I will not hesitate to strike the positions of the terrorists in the neighboring countries. We will keep on fighting them,” he said.

The ultra-hardline jihadist group has lost most cities it captured in northern and western Iraq in 2014 and 2015.

In Syria, it still holds Raqqa city as its main stronghold, as well as most of Deir al-Zor province, but is losing ground to an array of separate enemies, including U.S.-backed forces and the Russian-backed Syrian army.

The group has carried out bombings in Iraqi and Syrian cities as its caliphate has shrunk.

(Writing by John Davison in Erbil; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Dominic Evans)

Iraqi forces recapture Mosul government buildings, museum

Military vehicles of federal police are seen during a battle with Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq, March 7, 2017. REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani

By Isabel Coles and John Davison

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – Iraqi government forces fighting to drive Islamic State from western Mosul on Tuesday recaptured the main government building, the central bank branch and the museum where three years ago the militants had smashed statues and artifacts.

The government buildings had been destroyed and were not used by Islamic State, but their capture still represented a symbolic victory in the battle over the militants’ last major stronghold in Iraq.

An elite Rapid Response team stormed the Nineveh governorate building and government complex in an overnight raid, spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Abdel Amir al-Mohammadawi said.

They also seized a building that housed Islamic State’s main court of justice, known for its harsh sentences, including stonings, throwing people off building roofs and chopping off hands, reflecting Islamic State’s extreme ideology.

“They killed tens from Daesh,” Mohammadawi said, referring to Islamic State by one of its Arabic acronyms. The raid lasted more than an hour.

The militants looted the central bank when they took over the city in 2014 and took videos of themselves destroying statues and artifacts.

Illegal traffic in antiquities that abound in the territory under their control, from the sites of Palmyra in Syria to Nineveh in Iraq, was one of their main sources of income.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi flew into to Mosul to visit the troops engaged in the fighting.

“Iraqis shall walk tall when the war is over,” he told state TV as he arrived there.

The breakthrough paves the way for the U.S.-backed forces to attack the militants in the old city of Mosul, the most complicated phase in the nearly five-month campaign due to the density of the population and the narrowness of the alleyways. The militants are dug in amongst civilians in the historic district.

It was from the Nuri Mosque in the old city that the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, declared in 2014 a caliphate also spanning parts of neighboring Syria.

The old city lies on the western bank of the Tigris river that cuts Mosul in two. About 750,000 people were estimated by aid organizations to live in west Mosul when the offensive started on this side of the city on Feb. 19.

The Iraqi forces took the eastern half in January, after 100 days of fighting. They are backed by air and ground support from a U.S.-led coalition.

Defeating Islamic State in Mosul would crush the Iraqi wing of the self-declared caliphate, which also suffering setbacks in Syria.

U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces cut the last main road out of the Islamic State capital there, Raqqa, on Monday. Islamic State is also fighting off the Russian-backed Syrian army as well as and Turkey and allied Syrian rebels.

The number of Islamic State fighters in Mosul was estimated at 6,000 at the start of the offensive on Oct. 17, by the Iraqi military who estimate several thousands have been killed since.

Lined up against them is a 100,000-strong force of Iraqi troops, Kurdish peshmerga fighters and Iranian-trained Shi’ite Muslim paramilitary groups.

Some of Islamic State’s foreign fighters are trying to flee Mosul, U.S. Air Force Brigadier General Matthew Isler told Reuters at the Qayyara West Airfield, south of the city.

“The game is up,” Isler said. “They have lost this fight and what you’re seeing is a delaying action.”

SNIPER FIRE

Islamic State snipers continued to fire at the main government building after it fell into government hands, restricting the movements of the soldiers.

Rapid Response sharp-shooters were firing back from the building. One of them said four enemy snipers had been killed.

“The fighting is strong because most of them are foreigners and they have nowhere to go,” said the head of a sniper unit for the Rapid Response, al-Moqdadi al-Saeedi.

More than 40,000 people fled their homes in the past week, bringing the total number of displaced since the start of the offensive to more than 211,000, according to the United Nations.

Dozens more streamed out of the Mamoun district in southwestern Mosul toward U.S.-trained Counter Terrorism Service (CTS) troops as machinegunfire rang out in the background.

U.S. special forces were also seen walking between buildings in the same area, some of them carrying assault rifles with scopes and silencers. Helicopters attacked targets just north of their positions as thick smoke filled the sky from various explosions.

Agencies say camps to accommodate them are nearly full even though the United Nations said last month that more than 400,000 people still in western Mosul could be displaced.

Several thousand have been killed and wounded in the fighting, both civilians and military, according to aid organizations.

(For map of Mosul click http://tmsnrt.rs/2fd0nGE)

(Writing by Maher Chmaytell; Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Trump signs revised travel ban order, leaves Iraq off

U.S. President Donald Trump delivers his first address to a joint session of Congress from the floor of the House of Representatives iin Washington, U.S.,

U.S. President Donald Trump delivers his first address to a joint session of Congress from the floor of the House of Representatives iin Washington, U.S., February 28, 2017. REUTERS/Jim Lo Scalzo/Pool

By Steve Holland and Julia Edwards Ainsley

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Donald Trump signed a revised executive order on Monday banning citizens from six Muslim-majority nations from traveling to the United States but removing Iraq from the list, after his controversial first attempt was blocked in the courts.

The new order, which the White House said Trump had signed, keeps a 90-day ban on travel to the United States by citizens of Iran, Libya, Syria, Somalia, Sudan and Yemen.

White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the new order would take effect on March 16. The delay aims to limit the disruption created by the original Jan. 27 order before a U.S. judge suspended it on Feb. 3.

Trump, who first proposed a temporary travel ban on Muslims during his presidential campaign last year, had said his original executive order was a national security measure meant to head off attacks by Islamist militants.

It came only a week after Trump was inaugurated, and it sparked chaos and protests at airports, as well as a wave of criticism from targeted countries, Western allies and some of America’s leading corporations.

“It is the president’s solemn duty to protect the American people,” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told reporters after Trump signed the new order. “As threats to our security continue to evolve and change, common sense dictates that we continually re-evaluate and reassess the systems we rely upon to protect our country.”

The leader of the minority Democrats in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, said he expected the revised order to have the same uphill battle in the courts as the original version.

“A watered down ban is still a ban,” he said in a statement. “Despite the administration’s changes, this dangerous executive order makes us less safe, not more, it is mean-spirited, and un-American. It must be repealed.”

Trump’s original ban resulted in more than two dozen lawsuits in U.S. courts. Attorney General Bob Ferguson of Washington state, which succeeded in having the previous ban suspended, said he was “carefully reviewing” the new order.

IRAQ’S NEW VETTING

Iraq was taken off the banned list because the Iraqi government has imposed new vetting procedures, such as heightened visa screening and data sharing, and because of its work with the United States in countering Islamic State militants, a senior White House official said.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, who along with several other senior Cabinet members had lobbied for Iraq’s removal, was consulted on the new order and the updated version “does reflect his inputs,” Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said.

Thousands of Iraqis have fought alongside U.S. troops for years or worked as translators since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. Many have resettled in the United States after being threatened for working with U.S. troops.

The White House official said the new executive order also ensures that tens of thousands of legal permanent residents in the United States – or green card holders – from the listed countries would not be affected by the travel ban.

The original order barred travelers from the seven nations from entering for 90 days and all refugees for 120 days. Refugees from Syria were to be banned indefinitely but under the new order they are not given separate treatment.

Trump’s first order was seen by opponents as discrimination against Muslims. The White House official said the new order had nothing to do with religion and that the administration would reset the clock on the 90-day travel ban.

But House of Representatives Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said “the Trump administration’s repackaging has done nothing to change the immoral, unconstitutional and dangerous goals of their Muslim and refugee ban.”

“NO ALLEGED CHAOS”

Trump publicly criticized judges who ruled against him and vowed to fight the case in the Supreme Court, but then decided to draw up a new order with changes aimed at making it easier to defend in the courts.

Refugees who are “in transit” and already have been approved would be able to travel to the United States.

“There’s going to be a very orderly process,” a senior official from the Department of Homeland Security said. “You should not see any chaos so to speak, or alleged chaos at airports. There aren’t going to be folks stopped tonight from coming into the country because of this executive order.”

The FBI is investigating 300 people admitted into the United States as refugees as part of 1,000 counter-terrorism probes involving Islamic State or individuals inspired by the militant group, congressional sources told Reuters on Monday, citing senior administration officials.

An FBI spokeswoman said the agency was consulting its data to confirm the information.

The White House official said U.S. government agencies would determine whether Syria or other nations had made sufficient security improvements to be taken back into the refugee admissions program.

The new order spells out detailed categories of people eligible to enter the United States, such as for business or medical travel, or people with family connections or who support the United States.

“There are a lot of explicit carve-outs for waivers and given on a case-by-case basis,” the official said.

(Additional reporting by Patricia Zengerle, Doina Chiacu, Mica Rosenberg, Tim Ahmann and Idrees Ali; Editing by Bill Trott and Nick Tattersall)

Twelve treated for chemical weapons agents in Mosul since March 1: U.N.

Iraqi special forces soldiers walk on a street during a battle with Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq March 3, 2017 REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Twelve people, including women and children, are being treated for possible exposure to chemical weapons agents in Mosul, where Islamic State is fighting off an offensive by U.S.-backed Iraqi forces, the United Nations said on Saturday.

The U.N.’s World Health Organization has activated with partners and local health authorities “an emergency response plan to safely treat men, women and children who may be exposed to the highly toxic chemical,” the agency said in a statement.

It said all 12 patients had been received since March 1 for treatment which they are undergoing in Erbil, the capital of Iraq’s Kurdish region, east of Mosul.

Four of them are showing “severe signs associated with exposure to a blister agent”. The patients were exposed to the chemical agents in the eastern side of Mosul.

The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said on Friday that five children and two women were receiving treatment for exposure to chemical agents.

The ICRC statement did not say which side used the chemical agents that caused blisters, redness in the eyes, irritation, vomiting and coughing.

Iraqi forces captured the eastern side of Mosul in January after 100 days of fighting and launched their attack on the districts that lie west of the Tigris river on Feb. 19. The eastern side remains within reach of the militants’ rockets and mortar shells.

Defeating Islamic State in Mosul would crush the Iraqi wing of the caliphate declared by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in 2014, over parts of Iraq and Syria.

The U.N. Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq, Lise Grande, called for an investigation.

“This is horrible. If the alleged use of chemical weapons is confirmed, this is a serious violation of international humanitarian law and a war crime, regardless of who the targets or the victims of the attacks are,” she said in a statement.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Catherine Evans)

Red Cross says seven treated for exposure to toxic agents near Mosul

Khatla Ali Abdullah, 90, is embraced as she flees her home as Iraqi forces battle with Islamic State militants in western Mosul. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

BAGHDAD (Reuters) – Five children and two women are receiving treatment for exposure to chemical agents near the Iraqi city of Mosul, where Islamic State is fighting U.S.-backed Iraqi forces, the International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday.

The ICRC “condemns in the strongest possible terms the use of chemical weapons during fighting around the Iraqi city of Mosul”, it said in a statement.

The organization said it did not know which side used the chemical agents that caused blisters, redness in the eyes, irritation, vomiting, and coughing.

The United States has warned that Islamic State could use weapons containing sulfur mustard agents to repel the offensive on the northern Iraqi city.

ICRC medical teams were supporting local medical teams treating the seven patients, who were admitted over the past two days to Rozhawa hospital in Erbil, east of Mosul, the organization said.

The ICRC had reinforced 13 medical centers in areas surrounding Mosul with capacity to treat gas attacks victims, ahead of the offensive that started in October.

Iraqi forces captured the eastern side of Mosul in January after 100 days of fighting and launched their attack on the districts that lie west of the Tigris river on Feb. 19.

Defeating Islamic State in Mosul would crush the Iraqi wing of the caliphate declared by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in 2014, over parts of Iraq and Syria.

(Reporting by Maher Chmaytelli in Baghdad and Stephanie Ulmer-Nebehay in Geneva; Editing by Dominic Evans)

Iraqi forces in Mosul fight Islamic State counter-attack

An Iraqi special forces soldier fires as other soldiers runs across a street during a battle in Mosul, Iraq March 1, 2017. REUTERS/Goran Tomasevic

By Stephen Kalin

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – Islamic State fighters launched a counter-attack against advancing U.S.-backed Iraqi forces in western Mosul during an overnight storm, as the battle for control of the militants’ last major urban stronghold in Iraq intensified.

Explosions and gun fire rang out across the city’s southwestern districts in the early hours of Thursday. The fighting eased in the late morning, although a Reuters correspondent saw an air strike and rebel mortar fire.

A senior Iraqi officer said Islamic State staged its attack on units from the elite Counter Terrorism Service (CTS) when the storm hampered air surveillance and on-the-ground visibility.

He said some militant fighters hid amongst displaced families to get close to the U.S.-trained troops.

Iraqi forces captured the eastern side of Mosul in January after 100 days of fighting and launched their attack on the districts that lie west of the Tigris river on Feb. 19.

Defeating Islamic State in Mosul would crush the Iraqi wing of the caliphate declared by the group’s leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, in 2014, from Mosul’s grand old Nuri mosque.

Residents reported that civilians were killed in air strike on an Islamic State-run mosque on Wednesday, highlighting the perilous situation facing hundreds of thousands of Mosul residents as the allied forces step up their campaign.

The residents said the blast collapsed or damaged a number of neighboring houses, many of which are badly made and poorly maintained. A spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition said he was not aware of an air strike on the Omar al-Aswad mosque.

The mosque was where Islamic State sent members of the Iraqi national police and armed forces to surrender their weapons and register in a militant database when the group seized control of the city in 2014. In return they received a pass to prevent their arrest and possible execution at militant check points.

QUEUES FOR FOOD

The Iraqi military believes several thousand militants, including many who traveled from Western countries, are hunkered down in Mosul among the remaining civilian population, which aid agencies estimated to number 750,000 at the start of the latest offensive.

The militants are using suicide car bombers, snipers and booby traps to counter the offensive waged by the 100,000-strong force of Iraqi troops, Kurdish peshmerga fighters and Iranian-trained Shi’ite Muslim paramilitary groups.

More than 28,000 civilians have been forced from their homes in western Mosul since the Feb. 19 offensive began, while the total number displaced since the battle for Mosul started in October exceeds 176,000, according to the United Nations.

On Thursday, more than a thousand more streamed out southern Mosul, the majority on foot. Some said the militants fired at them as they crossed a defensive trench.

One bearded man with a rod though his broken leg was carried by six men in a rug, while an old woman was pushed in a rickety fruit cart.

Nearby, a Humvee brought a family wounded in a mortar attack to a CTS clinic. Medics cleaned their wounds and wrapped them in blankets.

Many fleeing residents complained of hunger. One boy, Ali, held his baby sister as they queued for food handouts. He said they tried to flee on Wednesday but gave up when they came under Islamic State gunfire. On Thursday they managed to get out.

The Iraqi military is taking women and children to camps and screening men to make sure they are not Islamic State fighters. Hundreds of women and children gathered in one abandoned bus station in the open rain to receive food from the army and a local charity.

A counter-terrorism officer fired his pistol in the air to keep the growing crowd in line.

(Reporting by Stephen Kalin in Mosul; Writing by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Richard Lough)